COMMONS AMENDMENT (Hansard, 28 July 1981)

§ The Lord Chancellor
My Lords, your Lordships 662 will remember that in this House we passed an amendment at the suggestion of the Lord Chief Justice, supported by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Roskill, to the effect that the Moonie-type libel and slander cases should be exempt from the rule requiring a compulsory jury if either party demanded it. The amendment was strongly attacked in the House of Commons, and I am bound to say that I remain very much of the same opinion as I previously held in the House. But there are times when one is wise to retreat before the troglodytes, reactionaries and pterodactyls, and the other strange creatures in the undergrowth who oppose law reform, and I now propose to take this cautious approach, hoping perhaps to fight another day.
The effect will be that the length of trials in such cases will be doubled. The juries for trials of this length will no longer be random because almost everybody will be excluded from them owing to the fact that everybody who ought to be a juror is excused; namely, full-time workers, shopkeepers and the others at the heart of the jury system. Of course there will be a very adverse effect on the actual transaction of business in the courts, owing to the increased length of trial and to the fact that there are a number of people in prison who ought to be tried sooner by a red judge than will now be possible, or who are on bail and will have to undergo even longer delays. But as I say, discretion is the better part of valour, and to some extent I have got rid of some of the worst evils through the good offices of the Lord Chief Justice, who has made a practice direction—which he is fully entitled to make—which will do something to remedy the evils that the troglodytes have perpetuated. My Lords, I beg to move that the House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 8.

§ Lord Elwyn-Jones
My Lords, seldom can such a proposal have been moved from the Woolsack with such total lack of conviction and enthusiasm. I have little doubt that had we enough time and the matter was of sufficient significance, we might invite Parliament to have a second look at it. But regardless of whether I come within the category of troglodyte, pterodactyl, or whatever other heraldic or other animal that came into the vivid imagination of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, I think we had better bow before what strength and quality this storm has.

§ The Lord Chancellor
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord, and I shall kiss the rod on behalf of the House and other progressive characters in it.